(Lisa Acker Moulder, director of the Betsy Ross House, with the tools and ingredients using in Colonial times to make chocolate. Credit: Hadas Kuznits)

By Hadas Kuznits

A tasty historic demonstration comes to the Betsy Ross House next week.

Lisa Acker Moulder, director of the Betsy Ross House at 239 Arch Street in Old City, says that from December 26th through 31st, they’ll be hosting free historic chocolate-making demonstrations.

She says chocolate in the 18th century was plentiful and inexpensive, but was very different than what you would think of as chocolate today.

“Chocolate ranked up there with tea and coffee as one of the popular drinks in the 18th century,” she tells KYW Newsradio. “In the 18th century you wouldn’t have eaten chocolate. It wasn’t consumed that way — it was consumed as a beverage.”

She notes that George Washington even had it as part of the rations for the Army in the French and Indian War and the American Revolution.

And she says many people drank it as a breakfast meal during colonial times:

“When you taste the chocolate, you don’t get much chocolate — people taste different things. Some people find that the orange peel really stands out. I find that the cayenne really stands out.”

What makes it hearty?

“Probably the fact that the chocolate content in it is so high. It’s 90-some percent pure chocolate beverage.”